g pulled me back. No remorse stirred
within me. The sense of being free filled me with intoxication.... At
the end of the first day I was already far away--much farther than any
number of milestones could indicate. On that first day her image began
to fade away already--the image of her who had waked up to meet painful
disillusionment, or worse maybe. The ring of her voice was passing out
of my memory.... She was becoming a shadow like others that had been
left floating much farther behind me in the past.

FELIX

Oh, it isn't true! So quickly could she not be forgotten. So
remorselessly could you not go out in the world. All this is meant as a
sort of expiation. You make yourself appear what you are not.

JULIAN

I am not telling you these things to accuse or defend myself. I am
simply telling you the truth. And you must hear it. It was your mother,
and I am the man who deserted her. And there is something more I am
compelled to tell you. On the very time that followed my flight I must
look back as the brightest and richest of any I have ever experienced.
Never before or after have I reveled to such an extent in the splendid
consciousness of my youth and my freedom from restraint. Never have I
been so wholly master of my gifts and of my life.... Never have I been
a happier man than I was at that very time.

FELIX (_calmly_)

And if she had killed herself?

JULIAN

I believe I should have thought myself worth it--in those days.

FELIX

And so you were, perhaps, at that time.--And she thought of doing it, I
am sure. She wanted to put an end to the lies and the qualms, just as
hundreds of thousands of girls have done before. But millions fail to
do it, and they are the most sensible ones. And I am sure she also
thought of telling the truth to him she took to husband. But, of
course, the way through life is easier when you don't have to carry a
burden of reproach or, what is worse, of forgiveness.

JULIAN

And if she had spoken....

FELIX

Oh, I understand why she didn't. It had been of no use to anybody. And
so she kept silent: silent when she got back from the wedding--silent
when her child was born--silent when, ten years later, the lover came
to her husband's house again--silent to the very last.... Fates of that
kind are to be found everywhere, and it isn't even necessary to
be--depraved, in order to suffer them or invoke them.

JULIAN

And there are mighty few whom it behooves to judge--or to co